In the Grapevine segment of Special Report today 8/23/05, Brit Hume assailed the coverage on CNN as excessive, painting Pat Robertson as a used-up and unimportant person.

From the Foxnews.com website:

Pat not so powerful?

"Televangelist Pat Robertson's political influence may have been declining since he came in second in the Iowa Republican caucuses 17 years ago and he may have no clout with the Bush administration, but you wouldn't know that from watching CNN today.

CNN covered his call for Hugo Chavez's assassination at length, undeterred by the fact that during the noon hour CNN's own analyst, Bill Schneider, said Robertson had little influence. At the top of the next hour, there it was again followed by a glowing report on the alliance between Chavez and Cuban President Fidel Castro. And it led CNN's three-hour "Situation Room," followed minutes later by live coverage of reaction from the Venezuelan ambassador, and then nearly two hours after that an in-studio interview with the ambassador."

As Melanie reported earlier, Stuart Varney (in for Neil Cavuto) conducted an interview about the comments with a military analyst on a purported business program. John Gibson's odious "My Word" segment was devoted to it, and several references were made to it during his program the Big Story: one with G. Gordon Liddy and another with Judge Andrew Napolitano. (Unfortunately I'm experiencing technical difficulties and can't access the recording of the program for more specific details.) Shepard Smith had at least one segment on it during his Fox News Live this evening, and as I eavesdrop on Hannity and Colmes right now it is being reported at the bottom of the hour. It is also currently one of the top stories on FoxNews.com. And to top it all off the so-called "All-Stars" on Hume's own show devoted a segment to discussing the subject.

Comments: Well where to begin. Too much coverage? HA! Hahahaha! Aruba! Terri Schiavo! Ward Churchill! The Big Story on August 2 spent the entire hour on the plane which had crashed upon landing in bad weather in Canada. The list is endless.

Where does Brit Hume get off deriding another network's coverage? What kind of journalist publicly attacks his competitors? (It's a rhetorical question.)

And why the focus on Pat's power and influence? If I were of a conspiratorial bent I'd suspect that there may be something in the works and the White House wants (Fox) to put as much distance between them and Robertson as possible.

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